


Love and the Soul

by foolhearty



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Alternate Universe - Greek Mythology, Ever After Zine, Fairy Tale Elements, M/M, Promptis - Freeform, eros/psyche au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-07-28 22:27:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16251044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foolhearty/pseuds/foolhearty
Summary: On dark wings Prompto had never seen before, Noctis had taken flight and disappeared; it was only now, as Prompto set about making things right by pleading for another god’s help, that Prompto learned of Noctis’ whereabouts. He was here, in the house of Bahamut, but still so far from Prompto’s reach...





	Love and the Soul

**Author's Note:**

> This oneshot was written for the Ever After Zine, a promptis zine I took part in! Love and the Soul is a condensed retelling of the Eros/Psyche myth, using only one of the many trials Psyche underwent while trying to please Aphrodite and re-win Eros' love. Please enjoy!

The piles of grains and greens around him are massive and daunting: mixed and unorganized, blended more acutely than any plated salad would ever have the chance to be. Prompto stares at the mess in dismay, eyeing the sun through a window as it sinks lower and lower into the sky; with each passing moment, he wastes seconds on his time limit. By dawn, on the order of the god Bahamut, Prompto must have the mess in this massive storehouse sorted. A pile for the beans, one for the leafy greens, and heavens’ forbid the lentils mix with the barley. It is the task that Prompto must accomplish to be reunited with his love, and already he fears failure.

Left alone to complete the task, Prompto begins with shaky hands and aching eyes; he has never been secretive about his emotions, it’s one of the things Noctis had claimed to love so dearly about him before their separation.   
  
“You’re an open book for me,” Noctis had appraised on their first night together: the night of their first meeting, and the night of their wedding. Prompto had not been able to see Noctis’ face from behind his hood and veil, but the sorrow in his voice had made Prompto believe he was frowning. “I apologize that I cannot be the same for you. I apologize that I must be hidden from you.”

It had been difficult, yes, living with no clue about his husbands appearance. It had driven Prompto to tears at times, knowing the gods would deny him the simple pleasure of seeing the one he loves smile and sigh. He hadn’t been able to understand why Noctis would need to hide, until Loqi, Prompto’s brother, tricked him into stealing a glance by candlelight after Noctis had fallen asleep one night.

“What if he’s hideous?” Loqi had jested, needling Prompto. “More than that... What if he’s a monster? The gods are ever-cruel, brother. They would send a daemon to your bed as a joke and would laugh at the love you give it.”

Prompto had never cared that his husband may be ugly; he saw himself as ugly, after all, on many a day, but the idea that he had given himself time and time again to a beast had terrified him. He’d lit a candle and lifted Noctis’ veil one night, and that decision had changed their lives and relationship forever: Noctis was beautiful, and awake, and a god. The sheer sight of him made Prompto cry, and Noctis did too.

“I have to leave now,” Noctis had explained, looking at the time gravely wounded somehow. “If I can be betrayed by you, my heart, I can be betrayed by any.”

On dark wings Prompto had never seen before, Noctis had taken flight and disappeared; it was only now, as Prompto set about making things right by pleading for another god’s help, that Prompto learned of Noctis’ whereabouts. He was here, in the house of Bahamut, but still so far from Prompto’s reach. Bahamut will only speak on his behalf if he is able to overcome this trial to prove his determination to mend his broken bond with Noctis.

But Bahamut is not a kind god, nor is he forgiving. The task of sorting a food pantry had sounded easy to Prompto, before he saw the room. Now, he weeps as he picks grain after gain from the pile, only to see more pop up where he hadn’t seen them before.

After hours of this, Prompto stops, to give his hand a rest, and cradles it to his chest. He prayed for anything, something, to help the task along; the sky was fully dark now, but he could tell it wouldn’t be long before the sun rose once more and Bahamut returned to scold him for an incomplete task. He prayed, and the room chilled more than what the normal night air would allow, and suddenly from the window in poured a fleet of insects. Prompto screamed, fearing them as he has since the time in his childhood he woke up to a room full of crickets and wasps, but these insects passed him by in favor of attacking the unorganized piles of food.

Right before his eyes, a sea of ants and bees and butterflies was accomplishing Prompto’s task on his behalf, splitting into groups and working together to achieve what Prompt himself never could have hoped to on his own. He watched them through the night, dumbfounded and blessed, as one by one piles of soybeans were made distinct from piles of almonds and sesame seeds and more. By dawn, the task is long since complete and Prompto is left with a delicately organized storehouse all around him.

He doesn’t dare sleep, though he’s desperate to: to let Bahamut think the task had been so easy that he had extra time to rest would be a great folly, and would likely only anger the god and lead to further tests to prove his love and worth. He sits for three hours, until finally the first crack of daylight enters the room through it’s singular window and Bahamut storms the building the same way Prompto imagines he storms the battlefield whilst at war: loudly and victory-expectant.

Unable to see the draconic god’s true face, there is no way for Prompto to gauge his reaction upon finding the room sorted finely and perfectly, but he assumes the worst. He assumes the absolute worst, but fights through the fear and overcomes his tired, achy eyes to fix Bahamut with a fierce gaze that he’ll likely never be able to recreate in his life.

“I want to see Noctis. I want to apologize to him myself, and I want you to let him decide if I’ve done enough to fix things.”

When Bahamut is silent, Prompto clambers to his feet and his hands tighten into fists at his sides. “I want to see Noctis!” He insists, knowing that each second he spends yelling at a true god is something he will someday come to regret, but desperation and an influx of courage have him pressing the issue all the same. “I want to see him right now! Take me to him now!”

The walls around him begin to shake from the raw energy provided by Bahamut’s aura but Prompto doesn’t back down, and suddenly, as the grains of rice and kernels of corn and everything else begins to shake free and fall from their piles back into a mess on the floor, the room changes. In the blink of an eye, Prompto is no longer in the storehouse and he’s no longer dressed meagerly in makeshift servant’s clothes: the room he’s in now has a high ceiling and a doorway taller than the tallest mountain Prompto can imagine, and he’s dressed in something soft and pale and smelling faintly of lavender and chamomile.

“You never know how to quit,” a voice, loud as Bahamut’s own but with a touch of exhaustion, reverberates from across the room. From its source, Prompto spies a bed - a massive bed, making Prompto feel incredibly tiny and silly. From under the covers he spies a unkempt patch of deep black-blue hair, the same shade as the sky on the night he married Noctis. The voice continues: “You never think about yourself first.”

“I had to see you,” Prompto argues, striding across the room at half a sprint, not fearing Noctis despite his giant size here in the land of the gods. “I had to apologize! For listening to my idiot brother, for not trusting you to never lie to me!”

“You’re human. You scare easily.” Noctis reveals himself, head poking out from the sheets. “You were only behaving as nature dictated.” When Noctis finally opens his eyes, Prompto feels his breath leave his lungs and he begins to weep the same way he had wept when he saw Noctis’ face and eyes for the first time.

“It’s not an excuse. I hurt you, Noctis...”

“You did. And then I hurt you. And now you’ve made amends, and I still haven’t.”

Before Prompto can muster the phrase “what do you mean?,” Noctis is suddenly, inexplicably, standing directly before him, their noses touching and Noctis’ sheet cascading to the floor around them.

“I give you this as my recompense.” With a flutter of his eyelashes, Prompto realizes something has changed. He isn’t crying anymore, and he feels lighter on his feet than he ever has. It takes Noctis laughing at him to realize he isn’t even on his feet anymore to begin with: he’s floating, two sets of gorgeous butterfly wings lifting him into the air, and suddenly he’s every bit as giant as Noctis is. “You are beautiful, Prompto, and good to your very core and soul. I give you godhood, and my heart, eternally, and this time: with no secrets to separate us.”


End file.
